Too Useful To Waste
by Silver Fox Trot
Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost. A project with LittleMewLugia. Movieverse.
1. Soundwave

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

_**Please read first!**_ Before you accuse me of plagiarism, I want you to first know that I have asked for, and received, permission from LittleMewLugia to continue the snippet. This is a project we're doing. We both have a common start off point, but we want to see where we'll both end up. If you doubt me, please PM LittleMewLugia and ask. Thank you for you consideration.

Too Useful To Waste.

Chapter 1; Soundwave

It was after the battle that Sam Witwicky was found, broken and dying, and it was Soundwave who found him.

The Autobots had shielded him on the ground during the fighting, covering all ground routes into his location, but it was Sam's bad luck that Starscream had been looking for an opportunity, and seen one. All the Autobots, and Sam himself, were concentrating on the ground troops, temporarily underestimating the threat from the air.

It was the last time Sam would make that mistake.

Starscream had stooped down, like the bird of prey his alt-form was named for, but he was in robot form, not in plane form. His hands had lashed out and scooped up the human before anyone even realized what he was doing, and he pulled out of the steep dive, heading up and away with incredible agility and frightening speed.

Starscream was impatient, however, to rejoin the battle, and was not interested in taking prisoners, but wanted to get back to the battle. He figured that gravity would take care of his squishy victim, and dropped him, making sure there was a nice long drop onto an abandoned parking lot. Then, he rejoined the fray.

Sam had not died on impact, but he was dying when Soundwave found him. Soundwave thought that the human could have had valuable information, and wished Starscream had thought this through before dropping him like that.

He engaged his scans, in case his initial suspicion had been incorrect, but no, the boy was unconscious, his life signs slowing and becoming more erratic. Soundwave had scanned enough humans since arriving to know what was normal and not normal for humans.

However, even he checked twice when he found something that was definitely not normal for humans.

It had to be the boy's contact with the AllSpark during its destruction, he surmised. That had caused the human's heart to be infused with Spark energy. The AllSpark energy within him was not strong enough to generate a new body for him, but the protospark was instinctively trying to coalesce into a Spark, maybe in hope of going into the heart itself, as if it were an organic Spark chamber.

That meant there was a chance that the human's life and skills and knowledge need not be wasted after all.

Soundwave's hands were composed of an incredible assortment of interchangeable tools – like a Swiss army knife, but infinitely more versatile. Extruding the two tools he needed – one from each index finger- he used the sharp scalpel to slit the human's body open from neck to groin. Sam was too far gone to be aware of it, even when Soundwave cut away his ribs and the musculature around them.

Sam had merely minutes, if not seconds to live.

There it was, the Spark energy glittering over Sam's quivering, still-beating heart. Soundwave touched his probe to it, turned on the current. The Spark energy was drawn to the electrified rod, drawn up it to the bulb at the top, where it coalesced into a Spark. Soundwave was relieved: Sam's body had not been strong enough for the energy to have the time to do this itself, Soundwave had merely speeded it up, but he had worried that he'd arrived too late, and that the energy might have started to dissipate as Sam's body had begun to die. That seemed to be an invalid concern, he noted, as the last of the Spark energy joined the small but hot and very bright spark in the bulb. Soundwave activated the force-field to keep it from dissipating and turned off the current.

He lifted the bulb, no longer interested in the body of Sam next to him, which was now inert, the heart had stopped beating. Reaching into his chest compartment he searched for and located an empty cassette. He manipulated it into robot form, found it to be a non-flier, and triggered the opening of the chest plates. He lowered the probe till it was touching the Spark chamber, released the force field, and activated a negative current. Drawn by the current and by the Spark's own survival instinct, the Spark shot down the probe and entered the Spark chamber with a small sizzling noise.

The new Casseticon twitched slightly, but Soundwave closed its chest plates and folded it back into cassette form. As a blank, it had had no energy stores, so would need to recharge before it could online. How the boy would react on finding out the manner of his saving, Soundwave could not predict, but what mattered was that he had been saved. Any potential his new Spark might possess had not been wasted.

His sharp audios detected something approaching and the vibration frequency told him that they were Autobots. Folding into his SUV form, he accelerated away with his prize.

Soundwave knew the vibration frequencies of the Autobot's voices, too, so when he picked up the sound of the agonised keen a few minutes later, Soundwave knew that it was Bumblebee who had found Sam's physical remains.


	2. Soundwave II

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

Translation:Please note, when using the Decepticons, I'll be using Cybertronian time measurements as defined by canon. They are, after all, giant, evil, robots bent on conquering the Universe. I highly doubt they'll use any time units but their own.

Vorn = One Cybertronian year, roughly equal to 83 earth years.

_**Please read first!**_ Before you accuse me of plagiarism, I want you to first know that I have asked for, and received, permission from LittleMewLugia to continue the snippet. This is a project we're doing. We both have a common start off point, but we want to see where we'll both end up. If you doubt me, please PM LittleMewLugia and ask. Thank you for you consideration.

Chapter 2; Soundwave II

As Soundwave the temporary Decepticon base, he contemplated what to do with latest find. He knew for sure that he wanted to use it to help him bring the Decepticons to the glory they deserve, but the only question was how.

As Soundwave entered the base, it didn't even cross his processor to inform his fellow Decepticons on where he had been and what he had done. As far as he was concerned the only mech that need to know that kind of information was the decepticon leader, Megatron, and seeing as Megatron was dead, he didn't have to inform anyone.

At least, not until a new leader was chosen.

He made his way to his lab and locked it behind him.

Immediately upon entering he noticed that Ravage had returned from his mission, to retrieve the offlined body of Frenzy. He scanned the Casseticon and noticed no other injury apart from a partially severed head. A non-fatal wound when one has a decentralized neural-net.

"_Ravage: explain."_

"It's hard to sneak out of an enemy base when the one you are rescuing is being a total spazz. I calculated that it would be easier to escape if we weren't alerting the squishies to our location."

Soundwave decided to accept that explanation. It had been several vorns since he had seen his second oldest creation, but he remembered clearly how… _excited_… he could be.

"_Excuse: acceptable._ _Return to quarters. Repairing Frenzy. Mission orders to follow." _Ordered Soundwave, sitting down in his chair and getting out the necessary equipment need to repair the little Casseticon, it wouldn't take long.

"Yes, Soundwave." The feline-shaped Decepticon said. "Shall I inform Rumble about his brother?"

Soundwave shook his head and started basic repairs on Frenzy, ignoring Ravage as the Casseticon left the lab.

As soon as he heard the door lock, he opened his chest component and removed the only cassette within. He stared at the green and silver chassis of the small mech in his hands for several seconds before connecting it to a recharge berth that would insert the processed energon necessary for it to activate into its' system.

Soundwave then set to work repairing the spindly form of Frenzy.

********

One joor later, Soundwave completed the necessary repairs, but he was hesitant to online the mech in his lab. After a moment of deliberation, he folded Frenzy into his cassette form and placed him back on the table.

He turned his attention to the recharging mech. The cassette wasn't completely recharged, but it would do for now. It could finish the process in his chest compartment at this point. He unplugged the Casseticon, folded it back into its cassette form and placed into his chest compartment yet again, where it was soon followed by Frenzy.

Soundwave was now ready to move on to the second part of the plan that had been forming in his processor ever since he had discovered the boy and his Spark, a plan that would destroy the Autobots and leave the Decepticons the rightful rulers of the galaxy.


	3. Rumble

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: M for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

Translation:Please note, when using the Decepticons, I'll be using Cybertronian time measurements as defined by canon. They are, after all, giant, evil, robots bent on conquering the Universe. I highly doubt they'll use any time units but their own.

Vorn = One Cybertronian year, roughly equal to 83 earth years.

_**Please read first!**_ Before you accuse me of plagiarism, I want you to first know that I have asked for, and received, permission from LittleMewLugia to continue the snippet. This is a project we're doing. We both have a common start off point, but we want to see where we'll both end up. If you doubt me, please PM LittleMewLugia and ask. Thank you for you consideration.

Chapter 3; Rumble

Rumble didn't look up from his game when he heard the door open. He knew right away that it was not his Creator coming in; he could sense that Soundwave was in his lab, most likely repairing the frame of his twin.

Since it wasn't Soundwave coming in, it was most likely Ravage, thus a mech that wouldn't care what Rumble did, as long as there wasn't a mess.

He only stopped playing when he sensed Soundwave and his twin approaching the room. Rumble quickly turned off the X-box and hid it under his berth. Just because Ravage didn't care what his younger sibling was doing in his spare-time didn't mean his creator felt the same way.

Rumble had done the standard culture-download when he had arrived on this water-logged planet and he had discovered a term that fit his creator to perfection; Mother-Hen.

Not that he'd ever tell anyone but Frenzy that. He'd leave the suicidal acts to his twin, thank-you-very-much!

Rumble barely had time to hide his toy and grab a random data-pad for his I'm-not-doing-anything® routine, before Soundwave entered the room.

As soon as Soundwave entered the room, Laserbeak, Buzzsaw and Ratbat awoke from their recharge from their perch/berth located above Soundwaves' own berth.

Immediately, Rumble threw away the data-pad and all but teleported to Soundwaves' side.

"Howishehowishehowishe?" Demanded Rumble. Through his twin-bond, he knew the Frenzy was close and that he was alive, but as to what condition, Rumble couldn't detect that with Frenzy in Stasis-lock.

"Rumble! Keep quiet and he'll tell us." Hissed Ravage from where he was lounging on Soundwaves' desk. "Stop acting like a Sparkling."

Rumble decided to ignore his older brother and instead turned his attention to his twin who was currently being removed from within Soundwaves' compartment and placed on the desk.

Rumble climbed the desk and was able to reach the top in time to see Soundwave bring his twin back online.

Rumble waited patiently for his twins systems to completely reboot. Contrary to what Ravage believed, Rumble did have some patience, just not a large amount of it.

When Frenzy's optics finally brightened to their usual shade of blue, Rumble approached his twin a kneeled down beside him.

"Frenzy?" Asked a hesitant Rumble, looking into Frenzy's unfocused optics. Maybe Frenzy was still damaged? However, Rumbles' fears were put to rest quickly enough.

"R-R-Rumble?" Stuttered Frenzy, his optics focusing first on his twin and then finally settling on his creator. "S-Soundwave?"

Rumble looked up at Soundwaves face as the mech ran a scan. Now that he was online, it would be easier to scan for any damage to his neurological circuits.

"_Damage: minor. Recharge and defrag: sufficient."_

Frenzy and Rumble looked at each other and then looked back at their creator.

"Can't we do this later? We haven't been together in a long time!" Begged the twins, still completely synchronised, even after vorns of separation.

Soundwave gave them a stony stare.

They immediately quieted their complaints and went to their shared berth and entered recharge, leaving Soundwave to give his instructions to their other siblings.


	4. Ravage

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: M for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

Translation: Please note, when using the Decepticons, I'll be using Cybertronian time measurements as defined by canon. They are, after all, giant, evil, robots bent on conquering the Universe. I highly doubt they'll use any time units but their own.

Joor = One Cybertronian hour, roughly equal to 83 earth minutes.

Chapter 4; Ravage

Ravage stood at attention as his creator stared at him, ready to receive his orders.

Soundwave first gave his instructions to the twins Laserbeak and Buzzsaw. They were fairly simple: just find the Autobot base and do some surveillance, but they were _not_ to engage the enemy into battle. If they were caught, their orders were to retreat.

The orders weren't said in so many words. Ever efficient, Soundwave had a way of implying a great deal, though speaking very little.

It was only after they had left that Soundwave turned his attention to Ravage, who stood up straighter in response.

"_Infiltrate American government. Find out what they know about our kind_,_"_ ordered Soundwave and dismissed Ravage, who promptly jumped off the deskand headed for the door.

Ravage looked back at Soundwave as he exited the room and saw him pull out something from his chest compartment before the automatic doors closed behind him.

Curious, Ravage debated internally with himself for a moment, but in the end, he decided to continue with his mission. If it was something Soundwave wanted him to know, he would have shown it to him before he left.

He could always ask about it when he returned anyway.

*******

Ravage had assumed that his mission would be an easy one, and for the most part, it was. The fleshlings' security was rather pathetic.

Getting past the security cameras has been a simple task of creating a continuous feedback loop; he simply stuck to the shadows to avoid the gaze of the guards in the tower.

The tricky part had been the guards patrolling the grounds with their canines. It wasn't the fleshlings that had been the problem; it had been, but it was their pets that had caused him the most trouble so far.

He had almost been seen twice because of those pests, and both times because they had almost sniffed him out. If it weren't for the fact that he could emit low-frequency sounds that had sent them running with their tails between their legs, he would have most likely been seen.

And if he had been seen, he would have had to kill the fleshlings. He wasn't afraid of killing the fleshlings, but if he did kill them, that would leave bodies. If the bodies were discovered, the fleshlings would get suspicious, which would mean increased security and increased security could possibly mean Autobots.

That would be bad. Not to mention detrimental to his infiltration mission.

******

Once he had gotten past the guards, it was a simple matter of climbing into the cool vents of the building. He used his audios to follow the sounds of humming computer equipment to lead the dark coloured Casseticon to where the bases central computers were.

Inside the dimly lit room, Ravage kept to the shadows. Once again, it was necessary to avoid having to kill the fleshlings and draw attention to the fact that someone, or something, had broken in. Ravage had scoffed when he had learned what Barricade had had Frenzy do to learn the location of Lord Megatron.

Sure the little Casseticon was small and was fully capable of infiltration and data-gathering, like Ravage, but it was not his main function. Frenzy was built for sabotage, along with his twin.

If Ravage had been on that mission instead of Frenzy, the fleshlings**'** government would never have been aware of them until it would have been too late.

When Ravage finally found a suitable corner, well out of the way of the fleshlings, he settled down, off-lined all but the most essential systems to avoid any attention, and linked up with the computer to search for any reference to Autobots or Decepticons.

There was a surprising amount of information, not just on the Autobots, but on the Decepticons as well, and not just general information either. There was also specific information on individual Decepticons.

This would not do.

Most of it was out of date, and many of the Decepticons listed were actually long deactivated, but there was still a lot of accurate information. There were even special files for Starscream and Soundwave.

Ravage let out a low growl.

He was half-tempted to delete the information, or at the very least scramble everything, but he didn't **-** it would go against his orders. Besides, Ravage highly doubted that these files were the only ones the fleshlings had.

The Casseticon dutifully downloaded all the files**. **Soundwave had always been fond of the belief that knowledge was power, something Ravage completely agreed with.

Once the download was complete, Ravage disconnected himself from the computer**'**smainframe. While Frenzy may have thought himself intelligent by downloading a virus that disabled the planets communications, Ravage would have been foolish to do the same thing now.

Soundwave had deduced that one of the things the Autobots would do first upon allying with the fleshlings would be to rebuild their pathetic firewalls, indeed; Ravage had barely avoided figuratively running into one while downloading the files.

Content that he had gotten all that he could for the moment, Ravage headed back out the way he came in and headed back towards base. Now that he had completed his mission, he was intent on finding out what his creator was working on.

*****

"Commander, the bait has been taken."

*****

A joor later, Ravage entered the Decepticon base. The first thing he noticed was that it was empty of the mechs that his creator had brought with him from their ship, the Darksyde. The only mechs there were Soundwave, whom Ravage could sense was still in his quarters, and Barricade, who was currently playing guard-bot.

Ravage passed him without sparing him a single look. Most likely the others had been sent on various energy-gathering missions.

He sauntered over to the quarters he shared with Soundwave and his siblings and stood in front of the doors, waiting for them to open.

When they didn't, he growled in frustration and sent a message to Soundwave over the base frequencies, asking why he hadn't unlocked the door. It was at that moment that Ravage sensed something…_different_…with the Spark-bond that he held with his creator and siblings. The bond that allowed each other to know that they were alive, which direction, vaguely, they were in and in close contact allow them to know if they were damaged or not.

Ravaged focused on the bond, trying to find out what, exactly, was different. He immediately ruled out the death of one of his siblings, for it was nothing like that excruciating pain that was.

The Casseticon knew he had felt something similar before, but it had been such a long time ago. He searched his memory banks, trying to remember the last time he had felt it.

Then it clicked.

Soundwave was adding another Casseticon to their bond. He was creating another Casseticon.

******

Authors note;

Well, here is my fourth chapter, and lo and behold, it's a long one! I'd like to apologize for the shortness of the chapters, but I had no choice, I had to have at least one or two chapters to set everything up. Now, we are actually getting to some plot action!

I'd also like to take the chance to do some things I should have done in my earlier chapters, but completely forgot about; my thanks!

First and Foremost; LittleMewLugia, for letting me continue her fic and for helping with a few run-ons I was having trouble with.

Secondly; Kd Zeal, for his help with Soundwave, who would most likely, would have ended up talking like Blurr if it weren't for him!

And last, but far from least, my Beta for this fic; Dealing With It Now who has graciously accepted to beta for me, thank you!

**Remember; Story Alerts are nice, Reviews are better. There has been a study ****showing that the more reviews an author receives, the faster they update!**


	5. Laserbeak

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

**_Please read first!_** Before you accuse me of plagiarism, I want you to first know that I have asked for, and received, permission from LittleMewLugia to continue the snippet. This is a project we're doing. We both have a common start off point, but we want to see where we'll both end up. If you doubt me, please PM LittleMewLugia and ask. Thank you for you consideration.

Orn = One Cybertronian day, haven't found a direct translation, but most likely, following the pattern, it is 8.3 Earth days.

Chapter 5; Laserbeak

While many Decepticons despised being planet bound, especially if the planet was filled with squishy organic life, Laserbeak actually enjoyed being on a planet. This was because it was only on planets that he was able to use his flight capabilities at their maximum.

Soundwave was very much against his Casseticons, or indeed anyone else, using supersonic flight within the confines of a spaceship.

While Laserbeak did sometimes fly outside the ship while it was in orbit, flying in zero-gravity, it wasn't the same. For one thing, he couldn't feel the resistance that he felt when he flew in a planet's atmosphere and for a second, anyone could 'fly' in zero-G, but only a few specialized bots were designed for powered flight.

"Laserbeak!" Buzzsaw shouted from high above the Casseticon. "We have a job to do! Once we're done, then we'll have fun."

Laserbeak vented some air, but he stopped his aerobatics, for the moment at least.

"We'll split up. You go after the military man; I'll go to the Autobots' pet's house. One of them should lead us to their base," ordered Buzzsaw.

"Sounds good."

With their respective objectives, the twin Casseticons split up to start their search for the Autobot base.

*******

As it turned out, finding the military man was harder than Laserbeak had thought. Buzzsaw has it easy - he already had a designation and coordinates to help start his search. Meanwhile all Laserbeak had to go on was a grainy image and the intel that the Autobot Ironhide regularly visited the military squishy and his family unit.

Great.

After several breems of thinking, he decided that the best way would be to simply link up to one of the planets communication system, namely the internet, and cross reference the photo of his target with the media.

Within half an astrosecond, Laserbeak had a designation; William Lennox, as well as a set of coordinates. Things were starting to look up!

Now that the Casseticon had all the information he needed to complete his mission.

Laserbeak hacked into one of the planets global positioning satellites and set a course for the home of William Lennox.

*******

Flying high above the Lennox homestead, located in some rural part of the nation state that the Autobots had gained as allies, Laserbeak was disappointed to note that not only was the Autobot not with the squishies, but the family unit of squishies was also absent.

Slightly annoyed that his quarry was not there, the Casseticon wasn't all that worried. In fact, it was probably one of the best things that could have happened. Laserbeak could take this opportunity to find a place where he could observe without being seen and he could also place cameras around the building as well.

Even if he didn't find the location of the Autobot base, the Decepticons could always use the unwitting squishy as a source of information. His creator would be so proud of him!

Thus, Laserbeak set to work planting his spy cams just about everywhere he could reach. He even planted a few in the building that housed the quadrupeds, Soundwave expected all his creations to be thorough in everything they did, whether spying on Autobots, or setting a prank for the Seekers.

When he was content that he had enough spy cams in the dwelling, as well as the surrounding area, Laserbeak took off to find a place where he could avoid being discovered and waited for the Autobot and squishies to come back.

He didn't have long to wait. Just as he was getting settled in the nook of a tree, he heard the tell-tale roar of an automobile nearing his targets dwelling. He linked up with his camera and started recording.

*******

When Will saw his house in the distance, he allowed himself to relax slightly. The past few days had been incredibly rough, not just on him, but on his family as well.

Since Optimus Prime had sent his message into the depths of space, several Autobots had arrived, along with confirmation that there were still others out there. Ironhide had said that it would most likely be decades, possibly even centuries, before everyone reached Earth.

The only downside to this was that the Decepticons had also received the message and recently one of Megatron's most loyal followers had arrived, a mech by the name of Soundwave.

Apparently, he was one of the few of Megatrons followers that fell into the loyal, powerful and smart categories. His appearance had worried the Autobots so much that they had requested that everyone involved with the Autobots, including immediate family, be moved to a more secure location.

That had been a month ago.

During that time, the Autobots had worked with the military to set up a trap for Soundwave. So far, he hadn't taken the bait, but the Autobots were confident that it wouldn't be long until the trap was sprung.

When they had finally arrived at the farm, Lennox helped his wife Sarah get Annabelle out from Ironhide's back seat and then removed the baby-seat. While Ironhide would tolerate the device while driving around with Annabelle, once the baby was out, he expected the seat to follow.

Will smiled tiredly at his wife and sleeping daughter.

"Tired?" asked Sarah, while gently rocking the baby in her arms.

"Yeah," said Will. "Go ahead without me; I just want to ask Ironhide a few questions before I go inside."

Once his wife was inside the house, Will rounded on Ironhide.

"Alright, spill."

"Spill? The only thing I have to spill would be internal fluids." Muttered Ironhide, slightly confused. Why would Will want him to leak internal fluids all over him?

Will, on his part, sighed in frustration.

"It's an expression."

"Well you humans certainly use odd expressions."

"Stop going off topic. I know you got a message from one of the Autobots; you've been quiet ever since we crossed past Colorado. I didn't say anything in front of Sarah because I didn't want to worry her, but if there was an attack on one of my men…" Will let the rest of the sentence hang; if there was an attack, he wanted to know who, where and when.

"There was an attack, but none of your men were the target."

It was silent for several seconds. Will didn't think he wanted to think about whom else could have attacked, but he asked anyways.

"Who was attacked?"

"Bumblebee and Hound. They were transporting Sam, his family and Mikaela."

Will swallowed nervously. He hated were this line of questioning was going, but if Ironhide wasn't revealing anything, then that meant that something terrible had happened."

"Were there any casualties?"

"Only one."

Silence reigned for several seconds.

"Who?"

"Sam Witwicky."

Will was stunned into complete silence. Ironhide proceeded to tell him what had happened, from the attack by Barricade and Scavenger on the small convoy, to Starscream's surprise appearance and what he had done to the boy.

******

Laserbeak listened intently to the Autobot and Squishy as the talked about the attack that had happened earlier. He had been aware that Soundwave had launched an attack against a pair of Autobots, but he wasn't aware of the details because he and his siblings had been on a search to locate Frenzy.

So, the Autobots pet saviour had died and two of their small numbers were injured, most likely seriously.

Laserbeak wished they would move on to another topic, like what they planned to do about the attack. While Laserbeak welcomed the knowledge of what had happened, Soundwave was already aware of what had happened and thus the information was useless to his cause.

Laserbeak perked up when they started talking about what had happened after the battle.

Naturally, that was when the drawling voice of Ravage interrupted him over the Casseticons private com channel.

"Laserbeak."

Said Casseticon vented some air out of frustration before he answered.

"Yes, Ravage?" Laserbeak was so tempted to point out that he was in the middle of something important, and maybe even throw in an insult or three towards his brother, but he refrained. If only for the simple fact that Soundwave could have been listening in as well.

"Soundwave wants you and Buzzsaw to return to base, now. He has something urgent to show us."

Laserbeak concentrated on his targets for a few seconds before sending another message to Ravage.

"Fine, but Buzzsaw isn't with me, he's following another lead. You'll have to contact him yourself; I think my target is starting to become aware of my presence."

"Fine." Came the response, then the com line went dead. Laserbeak waited for several breems before taking off as well, making a low-altitude detour to avoid being seen by the Autobot as his sensor sweeps. Once he was sure he was well out of range, he ascended quickly and made his way back to the base.

******

By the time Laserbeak reached the base, the systems local star had risen above the edge of horizon. Not that he could tell that from looking, because it was raining, hard. He was also low on energy.

Needless to say, when he finally entered the shelter of the base, Laserbeak was tired and irritable. He ignored the sentry currently on duty; he didn't even bother to look at who was on duty.

When he arrived at Soundwaves quarters, he stared solemnly at the door until it opened. At this point in time, he didn't care about what his creator had to show him, all he wanted as a cube of energon, something to remove all the water from his systems and maybe a few orns of recharge. In that order.

When he entered the room, ne noticed that his twin had arrived before him and that the rest of his family was currently crowded around something on Soundwaves desk. No one even bothered to look at him when he entered, not even his twin.

Curious as to what they were all so focused on, Laserbeak leaped onto the desk in one shot, with a little help from his jetpack.

Immediately upon landing he noticed what had gotten his brothers attention. Sitting up Soundwaves cupped hands was a sparkling, a Casseticon sparkling no less.

He was a non-flier model, specifically; he was almost like a miniature mech. He was built a little sturdier than Rumble and Frenzy, but he was still smaller than Ravage. His frame was coloured a deep green with some silver thrown in as well. He also had the yellow optics of a neutral Cybertronian.

Laserbeak looked at the little sparkling with interest. It had been vorns since he had been this close to one, certainly longer than the war had been going on, that was for certain.

Laserbeak slowly made his way over to Ravage who, being the oldest, would most likely have more information than his other brothers.

"Ravage…" started the Casseticon.

"Don't bother, 'Beak," his twin muttered darkly. "He won't tell us anything and neither will Soundwave. All we were told is that we now have a new little brother."

Laserbeak started at what was apparently his newest sibling. He closed his optics as he searched for the spark-bond that, indeed, proved that the little one in front of him was indeed his sibling.

The strongest bond in his spark was with his twin, the next strongest on was with his creator, followed by each of his siblings. He searched a little more, until he found it, a spark-bond that hadn't been there earlier. It was thin, delicate bond, one that would be easily fractured, but it was there nonetheless.

He opened his optics and smirked.

"Looks like Ratbat isn't the baby anymore." He then looked up to his creator. "What's his designation?"

Soundwave was silent for a moment.

"_Designation: Discord."_

Laserbeak tilted his head, he sensed a story behind that name, but he didn't bother asking for it. If Soundwave wanted them to know, he would have told it already.

*****

Praise me. No, I mean it. I wrote 3/4s of this bad boy within the span of a few hours, my spare computer is a decepticon and I wrote one part of this story three times because of said decepticon. I even included Sam, and I even revealed his name. Be happy.

Basically what happened, I had to use the spare computer in the basement, so I saved the story to the story to my USB key. I loaded it on the other computer, but when I went to save, it said that the file was on my key, but all the other ones were there, then it closed Word. This happened twice. I almost gave up, but I know that there are lots of people waiting for an update this weekend and if I want to give my amazing beta; Dealing With It Now, a chance to go over it, I had better get it done tonight (Friday evening), no excuses short of a mortality would stop me!

**Authors run better on reviews that Alerts. I also promise to respond to all signed reviews and anonymous reviews that include an e-mail address, so if you have any questions, feel free to ask. If you see any errors, please point them out! Thank you.**


	6. Frenzy

Too Useful To Waste.

* * *

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

_**Please read first!**_ Before you accuse me of plagiarism, I want you to first know that I have asked for, and received, permission from LittleMewLugia to continue the snippet. This is a project we're doing. We both have a common start off point, but we want to see where we'll both end up. If you doubt me, please PM LittleMewLugia and ask. Thank you for you consideration.

* * *

Chapter 6; Frenzy

Frenzy stared at his new little brother who, so far, had seemed content to stay in Soundwave's cupped hands.

He didn't quite know what to think of the Casseticon, or what his creator was thinking, bringing a new sparkling into their group after such a long time.

Speaking of which, how did he get the sparkling in the first place? The AllSpark might have only been destroyed several orns ago, but the sparkling here was barely a joor old.

Something didn't add up.

He sent his speculation over the spark-bond he held with his twin. Sending a message over the spark-bond wasn't the same as sending one over a com. For the first thing, it was almost impossible to do except for twins; and for a second, it wasn't words that were sent, it was more akin to feelings, the only downside was that it could only be done in close-quarters. It was also Soundwave proof.

_What do you think?_

Frenzy had to only wait a Spark-beat before Rumble answered.

_No clue. Let's go and introduce ourselves. Let him know who the cool-cons __are._

The twins smirked at each other, but they made sure to hide them before they approached the little sparkling. No need to scare the little guy. Not yet, anyways.

The moment they moved closer to the sparkling, he stared at the twins and tried to hide deeper in Soundwave's hand.

Their creator countered this by opening his hand to reveal more of the Cassette. Discord gave a stare at the larger mech before turning his attention to the approaching twins.

They stopped, however, once they reached the edge of their creator's hand. Through trial and error - mostly error - they had learned that approaching scared, young sparklings when they were newly sparked was potentially dangerous to ones paintjob and optics, as they had learned when they had startled the then newly sparked Laserbeak and Buzzsaw.

Soundwave had left them scratched, dented and mangled, Frenzy's optic had almost been pulled out by a territorial Buzzsaw, for an entire orn before he decided that they had learned their lesson.

Discord certainly didn't seem as dangerous as the younger twins had looked, he certainly didn't have a large beak for a primary weapon, but who was to say he didn't have other weapons at his disposal, like a blade hidden in his arm or even a gun?

While Ravage most likely thought otherwise, sometimes Frenzy and Rumble did use something called 'common sense'.

Once they had stopped their approach, the sparkling stared at them for a few astrocycles before leaning closer.

An encouraging sign for the little sparkling, it had taken Ratbat almost a full Joor before he felt comfortable enough with his siblings to approach them from within Soundwaves hand, and look at how cowardly he had ended up being.

Frenzy stared as the sparkling edged closer and closer to him and his twin, until he was within touching distance.

He glanced at Rumble before turning his attention on Frenzy. The sparkling tilted his head and chirped.

Frenzy looked over at his twin.

_I think he likes me._

Rumble vented some air, a Cybertronian version of a snort.

_Yeah right. He doesn't even know you. Besides, he's just newly-sparked, I doubt if he's even aware of what his name is!_

_You're just jealous that he likes me more then he likes you._

_Am not._

_Are too._

They argued for several breems before Frenzy decided that this argument wasn't worth his time. He turned to the sparkling, only to find that he wasn't there. Neither was Soundwave.

He looked to his twin, who shrugged.

He looked around and noticed that Soundwave had left the room. But he had left the sparkling on his berth, in the care of Ravage.

Above the Frenzy and Rumble, Laserbeak and Buzzsaw tried to hide their laughter.

"What are you laughing at, you piece of scrap?" Demanded Rumble.

"You two, obviously." Replied Buzzsaw.

"If you two didn't notice Soundwave leaving, you're both stupider than I thought."

"Why I-" started Frenzy, but stopped when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see that it was Rumble.

"What?"

_Ignore them; we'll get back at him later. We have more important things to worry about. Like Ravage. We need to do something before he turns the __sparkling against us._

_Fin__e. Plan F34?_

_Hmmm, how about G12?_

_Oh! Good that's a good one. Think maybe we can get the sparkling to help us?_

_We won't be able to if we let Ravage influence him._

The twins then made their way to the recharge berth.

When they finally got to the berth, they say Ravage lounging on his side while Discord leaned back against his side.

"What that?" Discord pointed to a datapad on the edge of Soundwaves' desk.

"A datapad."

"What it do?"

"It holds information."

"Why?"

"Because that's what it was built for."

"Built for?"

"It's purpose."

This went on for awhile, with Discord pointing and asking, Ravage answering.

Frenzy and Rumble looked at each other.

"Is it just me, or does he have a glitch?"

"You mean the fact that he's talking like that idiot Grimlock?"

"Yeah."

"Let Soundwave deal with it. It's probably just a glitch in the language program he downloaded. Easily fixable."

"Hopefully this is his only glitch."

"Yeah. Now, enough about his glitches, we need to run interference."

"Fine."

They approached Ravage and the sparkling; Ravage gave them a cursory glance, but the sparkling stared at them again. He raised an arm and pointed it at them.

"What them?"

Ravage snickered.

"Who, not what."

"Who them?"

Ravage vented some air in a sigh.

"They are your older brothers, Rumble and Frenzy. Also known as the Glitch Twins."

"Hey!" The twins said in stereo.

"G-glitch?"

"Something you'll understand when you're older."

Frenzy and Rumble snickered, Ravage glared and Discord tilted his head and chirped in confusion.

Just as Frenzy was about to…request…that they be allowed to spend some time with their new little brother, Soundwave came back into the room. His optics immediately fell upon Frenzy and Rumble.

"_Prepare for a mission."_

"Frag."

* * *

AN - First of all, I'd like to apologize for the quality of this chapter, especially after that last one. I've learned one important thing; the twins, Frenzy and Rumble, are a terror to write when they are together. From now one I shall avoid doing so, unless I absolutely must.

The good news, next chapter should be from an Autobots POV! YAY! I won't say who, though. *Evil grin*. Now I'm sure that a few of you are wondering why I haven't spent much time with the Autobots, with the exception of a cameo by Ironhide. There is a very good reason for that. It's called angst. All I could think of when I thought about an Autobot chapter was that they would all be going

'Noooo, Sam's dead….." Cry.

Not exactly the best story, is it? Plus lots of angst depresses me and a depressed author = unproductive author.

I can't promise a long chapter though, but since I'm in the mood, I might finish it ahead of schedule.

PS, I've downloaded a trial version of Word 2007. All I can say is AWESOME. If I get enough requests, I might put up a review on my Livejournal.

BN - Hi all! This is the beta reader, Dealing With It Now, saying hello. I wanted to apologize to both readers and the author for getting a beta'd version back a little late on the last couple chapters, but otherwise just taking up space at the bottom here, near that convenient review button. It's real convenient; you know you want to press it…

**Authors work better with reviews than alerts, although both are great.**

**PS, I have an important ****questions for you readers. Because of the holidays, we, Dealing and I, are having a little difficultly because we are both so busy, her with shopping, me with school.**

**Now, either I can post un-betad chapter, filled with embarrassing errors, on ****the weekends and then replace them with beta'd chapters afterwards, or we can wait for the corrected version and you can get a lot of chapters at once in a few (three or four, max) weeks. **

**I'm ready for either, so it's up to you guys to decide.**

**Error-filled chapters weekly, or properly checked chapters later?**


	7. Optimus Prime

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

* * *

Chapter 7; Optimus Prime

If Optimus Prime had not been the twenty-eight foot tall leader of the Autobots, and if he had not been surrounded by several of his team members and by tiny, fragile organics, he would have been pacing.

But as it was, he was the leader of the Autobots, he did have several humans and Autobots surrounding him, and he was twenty-eight feet tall. So he resisted the urge.

He knew that pacing wouldn't help any and would only end up wearing down his gears. Ratchet already had his hands full repairing Bumblebee and Hound without him adding to it.

Normally, he also thought himself past the urge of going out and shooting something, preferably a certain Seeker, out of frustration. Ages of disregarding such urges had left him immune to them…most of the time.

This was not one of those times.

He had just gotten word a few short hours ago that Bumblebee, Hound, Mikaela and Sam had been attacked on their way back to Tranquility, Nevada. If it hadn't been for the arrival of Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, and Bluestreak, they most likely would have all been destroyed. As it was, Bumblebee was in need of major repair, Hound would be on light duty for a while, Mikaela was in the hospital and Sam…Sam was dead.

If Optimus had been capable of flinching, he would have flinched at the thought of Sam, of how the Decepticons not only killed the boy, but how they desecrated his body afterwards. He was not looking forward to telling everyone else. As the commanding officer, it would be his job to inform the the Autobots as to what had happened to the human that had destroyed Megatron.

Sometimes Optimus Prime wondered if Primus was laughing at him. It would certainly explain a few things.

He was distracted from his thoughts by the sound of opening doors, doors leading to them temporary med-bay on the planet. The med-bay was very limited in terms of tools, and most of them were sent from the limited selection that was on the Ark.

Optimus watched as Ratchet came out, wiping energon from his hands with a cloth, head held high. This was good; Ratchet never held his head up when he lost a mech.

"How is he, Ratchet?" There was no need to ask who he was talking about.

"He'll live, though he'll be offline for a while. Except for a severed energon line near his spark-chamber, it was, for the most part, superficial." Ratchet tossed the dirty cloth aside. "He's lucky that his new armour was as effective as it was. If he had been wearing his old armour, his spark-chamber would have been severely damaged."

Ratchet turned and closed the doors behind him, hiding those inside from the curious gaze of the nearby humans. Most of them were Lennox's men, but a few were from the former Sector Seven, working as government liaisons. They most likely had things that required the Autobot leader to look at and approve.

Optimus Prime nodded as Ratchet glanced meaningfully at the two humans surrounding the Autobots. "Optimus, I have something I need to discuss with you. In private." Ratchet spoke in English, in the hopes that they would take the hint.

Luckily for them, they did, and they beat a hasty retreat. One did not become an agent of a secret government agency without being able to read between the lines, and the soldiers had quickly learned Ratchetese.

Optimus waited for the last of them to leave before turning to his chief medical officer. _"What did you want to say, Ratchet?" _Optimus said in Cybertronian, even though there were no humans in the area. If Ratchet wanted to keep something private, then speaking their native language would be the easiest way.

"_It's about Sam."_ Ratchet hesitated for a second before continuing. _"I scanned his body before it was taken away. I found something…odd. I know First Aid will be arriving within the system sometime within the next orn. I want him to stay on the Ark and __analyze__ the scans. I don't have the necessary equipment here."_

"_Request__ granted. I'll inform Red Alert to pass the message to First Aid when I send in my report."_ Optimus vented some air through his vents in a sigh-like gesture_. "Those scans __would not be__ the only odd thing. I can't understand why they would cut open the boy like that, but didn't do anything else."_

Optimus turned and headed for his temporary office, signalling Ratchet to follow him.

"_If we're lucky, Nightbeat will arrive soon," Ratchet said. "But knowing our luck, he'll most likely arrive when we figure out what happened."_

Despite the gravity of recent events, Optimus Prime chuckled a bit.

"_I certainly hope that our luck is better than that, Ratchet. We'll need it__."_

_

* * *

  
_

AN; Hey guys, sorry for the shortness of the chapter, but this felt like the best place to end it.

I know a few of you are surprised that I have a chapter out, especially since I said that there wouldn't be one until after the holidays, since my beta is MIA until after the holidays. Well, Late Sunday night, I got a PM from a reader offering to Beta my chapters until Dealing With It Now is back

So, without further ado, I'd like to thank FanfictionWriter83729 for filling in for my beta!

Writer: Thanks, Silver! =) Enjoy, kind readers, and look forward to the next chapter. I know I am.


	8. Red Alert

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

_Please read first!_ Before you accuse me of plagiarism, I want you to first know that I have asked for, and received, permission from LittleMewLugia to continue the snippet. This is a project we're doing. We both have a common start off point, but we want to see where we'll both end up. If you doubt me, please PM LittleMewLugia and ask. Thank you for you consideration.

Chapter 8; Red Alert

Red Alert was not having a very good shift, but then again, he rarely had a shift that could be considered good.

The last 'good shift' that Red Alert could actually remember having was when Bumblebee and Jazz discovered one of Sideswipe's infamous traps, and then jury-rigged it so that it would only activate when Sideswipe approached.

Catching Sunstreaker had just been an added bonus.

Needless to say, that have been vorns ago, but he still remembered it fondly whenever being Chief Security Officer got to be too much.

And today was one of those days.

"What do you mean 'half the third deck just blew up'? Decks don't just spontaneously combust for no reason!" As the highest ranked office currently on the Ark, Red Alert was in charge of managing the entire ship, as well as the security duties he refused to give up, even temporarily.

"Well, the third deck is where we put most of Wheeljacks' inventions. Someone, I'm thinking Hot Rod or Hot Shot, thought it'd be a good idea to look through Wheeljacks' leftovers for a new upgrade," reported Inferno, standing in front of a seated Red Alert. Red Alert let his head hit his desk and groaned.

"Please tell me they weren't fatally injured…just enough to keep them in the med-bay, preferably offline, at least for a while."

"Mostly superficial damage, but I imagine they'll want First Aid to take a look at it when he gets here. You could always send them to the planet," added Inferno. "We have enough mechs on the _Ark_ already. If the Decepticons decide to attack, we'll be able to defend ourselves and the planet easily enough."

"No, we'll keep them on the ship; just give them something to keep them occupied. I know the inventory hasn't been done in a while. Besides, if I send them to the planet, Prowl will have my spark; he's already got the twins to deal with."

Red Alert stood up from his chair and made his way towards the only window in his office. For the most part, the window was a basic star-field, but in the distance the red and white mech could see some of the system's planets, and in particular the third planet from the local star. From their position in the inner asteroid belt, the planet looked little more than a blue and white dot.

It was very different from the silvers and blacks of Cybertron, home of the Autobots.

"It's not Cybertron, but it'll be home. One day," Inferno said. Red Alert jumped; he had forgotten that his friend was still in the office with him.

He responded without looking back. "I know. It's not Cybertron, it will never be Cybertron." Red Alert vented some air through his vents. "I hope it never becomes like Cybertron."

Just as Inferno was about to say something, the data-pad on the computer beeped. Red Alert turned from the window and sat down at his desk once again. He looked at the data-pad and saw that he had received a report from Optimus Prime. He opened it and spent the next little while reading it, then handed it to Inferno.

Inferno read it quickly, and then put the data-pad back down on the desk.

"Shall you inform Hot Rod and Hot Shot, or shall I?"

Red Alert shot him a look. "What do you mean? I don't have to inform them of anything."

If Autobots had had eyebrows, Inferno would have raised his.

"You mean you're not sending Optimus Prime backup even after finding out that Soundwave, one of the most powerful and intelligent Deceptions ever known, made it past _your_ defence grid with Primus knows how many Casseticons and Decepticons with him?"

Red Alert was silent for a few seconds.

"I hate it when you do that."

* * *

As much as Red Alert wanted to send the brothers to this planet, he had to wait for First Aid to see that Hot Rod and Hot Shot were in condition to fight. When it came to Wheeljacks' leftover inventions, it was always better to be safe than sorry.

But he would inform them that, if First Aid said that they were in an acceptable condition, yes, they could go to the planet, and no, they weren't allowed to gang up with Sunstreaker and Sideswipe against Prowl. They were to turn their energies to something more productive, like defeating the Decepticons that had made it to Earth.

But until their departure, they were to finish compiling the inventory of the _Ark_ that had grown with each mech that had arrived.

He entered the rather bare med bay. While most of scanners and other large objects had been left on the ship, Ratchet had had most of his tools moved to the planet; both to have them near in case of emergency and also to make sure that no one messed with them.

Not that anyone would be foolish enough. No one, on either side, was that suicidal. Ratchet took it as a matter of pride that his med bay had never once been breached.

As soon as Red Alert had entered the med bay, Hot Rod and Hot Shot turned to face him, hiding something behind their backs and trying to look innocent.

They failed.

Miserably.

They opened their mouths, probably to say whatever excuses they had thought up beforehand. Red Alert waved it dismissively.

"I don't want, nor do I need, to hear your excuses."

They shut their mouths and stood, loosely, at attention. When Red Alert spoke in that tone he was speaking as their leader, not their Chief Security Officer/Favourite Target/Friend. This was _Important_.

"I just got a message from Optimus Prime. I'm sending you to the planet." The two yellow and red mechs high-fived each other, something they had picked up from the planet's World Wide Web. "However, you'll only leave once First Aid and his brothers reach the _Ark_. Until then," Red Alert pulled a datapad from his sub-space pocket. "You two are on inventory duty and I want it properly done. If not, Ironhide will get an anonymous message indicating who the people were that messed with his cannons on Kaiba-5."

Hot Rod, being the oldest and slightly more mature mech between the two brothers, nodded and reached for the datapad. Both mechs left without a word, heading towards the cargo hold.

Red Alert, his self-assigned mission now complete, headed towards the Security room, to help Inferno increase the strength and safety of the planet's defence system.

It was going to be a long shift.

* * *

AN; Well, here ends yet another chapter. I kinda like how this one turned out, even though half the characters making an appearance having no dialogue.

Now, some one you might be wondering why I brought in Hot Rod and Hot Shot. There is a simple reason for this; they are both cool characters. Well, that, and I was running out of characters that I was semi-familiar with (I'm more knowledgeable about the Beast Era than the Original Series). As for their relationship, here's how it breaks down, they are brothers, but not twins.

In this verse twins are created when a single spark splits in two as its being introduce to a shell. Brothers are mechs that were raised by the same creator, but not necessarily at the same time. Hot Rod is the older brother and Hot Shot the younger.

**Remember, reviews are my bread and butter, the more I get, the more/faster I write!**

Thank you FanfictionWriter83729, for betaing this chapter!


	9. First Aid

Too Useful To Waste.

Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

* * *

Chapter 9; First Aid

First Aid practically quivered with excitement when his leader, Hot Spot, announced that they had officially entered the solar system of what was to be their new home.

He was anxious to get off the Protectobot ship and explore their new home; he had practically devoured the files that had been sent to them from the _Ark_. None of the files contained any sensitive material; nothing disastrous would occur if any Decepticon got a hold of it. It was mostly information about what had happened in a place called Mission City, a rough map of the planet with the division of the countries, and general locations of where to and where not to land in case of emergencies.

There was also a data file containing a download of the native language from the area they were based in. He was amazed to learn that the planet actually had over one hundred spoken languages and about just as many writing systems.

It was mind-boggling.

Streetwise and Blades were already in the Twins' betting pool for guessing how many times Prowl crashed his systems trying to learn them all.

He shuddered to think of what would happen if Red Alert tried to do the same.

Prowl was a smart mech, with an excellent processor in his cranial unit, but he just wasn't programmed to learn the nuances of hundreds of languages in such a short amount of time. That was more along the lines of a scout, like Bumblebee, or communications officer, like Soundwave and their very own Blaster.

He himself had bet that Prowl had crashed seven times already. He was pretty sure that he had it right, since he knew Prowls' processor almost better than the mech himself, mainly because he was the one that repaired it when their groups had met up several vorns ago.

First Aid decided that it would probably be a good idea to have a few Prowl- and Red Alert-compatible processors ready for when he arrived on the planet. At least Ratchet would have a few back-ups and could maybe take a break from fixing everyone. Especially Sunstreaker and Sideswipe.

Better make a few for Ratchets use as well.

It would take several hours to reach their rendezvous point with the _Ark_, more than enough time to make at least two for each mech. After all the vorns of practise, he could build a processor without optics and using only one hand.

Blades still owed him money for that bet.

However, Primus had different plans for the medic. Just as he was about to start on the backups, using both hands this time around, the com in his room beeped. One of his teammates wanted to speak with him.

"Hot Spot to First Aid, are you there?"

"First Aid here, is there a problem?"

"Nothing serious. I just got a communiqué from the _Ark_."

"What does that have to do with me? You're the leader."

"There's a message from Ratchet for you."

"And you're not sending it to me because…?"

"There was also a message from Optimus, which I need to discuss with everyone. You should come to the bridge; I'll give it to you then. Hot Spot out."

"First Aid out."

Then com line went dead…and First Aid couldn't shake the feeling of dread that entered his Spark.

* * *

First Aid was the last mech to reach the bridge, coming in just after Groove.

He sent his older teammate a look, silently asking if he knew anything about why they had been called.

Groove just shrugged. He didn't know anything either.

As soon as the door closed behind the medic, Hot Spot turned on the auto-pilot of their small transport vessel and turned to face his team. The normally energetic leader was very calm, which meant that this was serious business. The dread in First Aids Spark increased, tenfold.

"About three breems ago I received an encrypted message from Optimus Prime. A while ago they received Intel that several Decepticons had arrived on Earth. For their safety, Optimus Prime had the humans that were directly involved in the battle where Megatron was killed moved to a safer location.

"As we all know, Decepticons aren't above going after our defenceless allies in order to get petty revenge. With the help of Red Alert on the _Ark_, the Earth-based Autobots combed the planet, along with the armies of several ally nations. They turned up nothing.

"Optimus decided then that it was safe to send their newfound allies back to their daily lives. That's when one of the teams was ambushed." Hot Spot was silent, letting his team absorb what he was telling them.

First Aid clenched his fist tightly. It was far from the first time that they had received messages about fellow Autobots being ambushed, but he had hoped that with the defeat of their leader that the Decepticons would retreat to 'lick their wounds', as the humans so eloquently put it, at least for a few vorns.

"Which team?"

Hot Spot looked at him.

"Bumblebee and Hound. They were escorting Samuel James Witwicky, his family unit and Mikaela Banes."

Groove spoke up. "You mean the boy that destroyed Megatron?"

"Yes."

"Were…were there any casualties?"

"Only one. The boy, Sam. From what I read so far, Starscream grabbed him before they noticed the glitch and, well, you all know what he's like."

First Aid looked away, trying to purge horrible memories from his core processor. As a medic he was very much aware of what Starscream could do when he got a hold of defenceless organics. The results…were never pretty.

Blades spoke up next. First Aid was surprised that he had kept quiet this long.

"What's Optimus going to do, then? Is he just going to sit by while the Decepticreeps destroy this planet like they did Cybertron?"

"No, he's already working up a plan to deal with them," said Hot Spot, turning to face the passionate mech. "You, Streetwise and I are to go to the planet to help Optimus and his team."

He turned towards the two more pacifistic members of their unit.

"Groove, you are to go to the _Ark_ and help Red Alert and Inferno set up a stronger defence grid. Soundwave was able to make it past without leaving a trace. You've worked with Blaster before, so you'll know a bit of what to expect."

Groove nodded.

First Aid stepped forward.

"What about me? Shouldn't I head down to the planet to help Ratchet? I'm the only other medic in the sector, and the next closest one is Swoop, who won't reach the planet for quite a while."

Hot Spot shook his head.

"No, Ratchet has something for you to work on the _Ark_. He needs you to examine some scans he took. He doesn't have the necessary equipment on the planet."

First Aid paused for a while and then nodded in acceptance. As much as he wanted to see his mentor and explore his new home, if Ratchet wanted him to examine some scans, he knew that it must be important.

"Good," Hot Spot looked at his team. "We're nearing the rendezvous coordinates; commence preparations for the docking procedure. We'll leave our ship on the _Ark_ and head towards the planet in our transition forms. We must remember that the natives, for the most part, are unaware of our existence. Let's try not to be the ones to blow our cover, alright?"

"Who us," cracked Streetwise. "We never blow our cover!"

"Oh really?" said Hot Spot. "Then what about that incident on Nebulos?"

"That was an accident!"

"Sure it was."

* * *

AN: And yet another chapter done! I hope you guys like this chapter, I worked really hard on it. I wrote this ENTIRE chapter in just about 3 hours. And I know that this chapter follows the same chapter as the other ones, but don't worry, I'm finally done introducing most of the characters that will be appearing in the fic.

There are a few more that I'll bring in, but it won't be for quite a while and by then I shall have a different formula for introducing them.

**NEXT WEEK; THE PLOT ACTUALLY ADVANCES AND MORE SPARLING CUTENESS!**

**Review if you want to see Discord do some cute-Sparkling things. Ideas are welcome and you will receive credit for it if I put it in!**


	10. Starscream

Too Useful To Waste

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Summary: Both the Autobots and the Decepticons know how resourceful and inventive Sam Witwicky was. When Soundwave finds him dying after a battle, he wonders if he has a way to save Sam so his skills are not lost.

Warnings: Character death, minor blood and gore.

Rating: T for safety.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro and DreamWorks/Paramount. I make no claim to the contrary.

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Chapter 10; Starscream

Starscream had come to loathe many things over his many vorns, things like Megatron, Shockwave, Megatron, Optimus Prime, the Autobots, weak Decepticons, Megatron and giant gas planets had come to dominate his 'top ten' list.

However, for the moment, those things weren't on his 'top ten'. They weren't even close. No, at this moment, the things he hated the most was the fragging planet he was stuck on.

Along with the planet as a whole, there were also specific things on the planet that were really annoying him. Like the humidity.

Starscream let a shudder run through his frame at that thought. This planet had far too much of the substance for comfort. He could hardly believe that nearly three-quarters of the planet was water. There was no liquid water on Cybertron, what small amount there was, was in the atmosphere.

The water wasn't event he worst of it, no. That honour belonged to the dirt that covered what little the water didn't!

He was beginning to regret his decision to terminate the Autobots pet Squishy, especially after he learned that Soundwave's team hadn't actually _killed_ the Autobots that were with said squishy.

This meant that not only did he have an unusually group of Autobots on the planet with, but a group that the group was now out for energon. Preferably his, seeing as he was the only one that had killed during that battle.

And seeing as he couldn't leave the planet without setting off the security system that the Autobots had no doubt placed around their new _home_.

Starscream sneered. Home? This mud-ball of a planet would never replace Cybertron. It was too small, didn't have a proper atmosphere and was covered in way to much organic material.

_Parasitic_ organic material, like the kind that was currently covering his frame. From what little he had bothered to learn about the natives of the island he was currently residing on, the vermin were known as parrot. He had downloaded it so that he might _possibly-maybe_ get a little warning in case the Autobots found out where he was currently hiding.

Not likely, given that the Autobots were severely lacking in the flier department, for the moment at least.

Starscream cursed his luck. Without knowing if there were any loyal Decepticons to work with on the other side of the stupid Autobot security system, Starscream was in deep trouble.

He had no energon converter, no way to gather any intelligence, no way to leave the planet undetected, no place to recharge completely and a hoard of murderous Autobots and squishies that were probably tearing up the planet looking for him.

The only way things could get worse would be if Megatron dropped from the sky on top of him.

After letting such joyful thoughts bounce around his processor for a few breems, he came to the conclusion that he had only one option if he wanted to survive for any amount of time.

He'd have to join up with Soundwave and his group. For a while, at least.

As much as hated the mech, he was also they only one who could give him what he needed. Besides, it wasn't as if he was going empty handed. Starscream had information that he knew Soundwave would want.

With a vague plan forming in his processor, Starscream started his engines, scaring the colony of vermin from his frame, only to discover that they had left him covered in excrement.

He screeched curses at the birds and almost fired a shot at them, but he stopped himself. He had not flown all the way to the middle of an ocean to get away from the Autobots, only to reveal himself because of his own stupidity.

He'd come back and disintegrate this island personally after the Decepticons had gained control over the planet.

With more force than was possible for an F-22 Raptor, Starscream shot into the sky and sent out a signal on a frequency that only someone of Soundwaves calibre would be able to detect.

* * *

A few joors later, Starscream found himself on a small unpopulated part of the coast of a country the fleshlings called 'Mexico', as far as he could stay away from Autobots base, but still be on the continent in order to meet face-to-face.

If it had been up to him, Starscream would have chosen somewhere else, somewhere not on the American continent and in a country unfriendly to the Autobot allies. Like Cuba.

However, since he was the one to initiate contact, he wasn't in a position to make demands, yet. And besides, Soundwave would never have made it to the island anyways.

Stupid non-fliers. What was the point of being able to transform into machines to travel if the couldn't take you were you needed to be fast?

Soundwave chose that moment to appear before the irritated seeker.

"About fraggin' time you showed up! I don't have all Solar-Cycle!"

Soundwave said nothing, all he did was rise his gun and aimed it at Starscreams head.

* * *

**Author Note, VERY IMPORTANT!**

First I'd to say that I didn't mean to not update for the last little while, but I have a good reason not to, so I won't apologize. The most important reason is that my father is in the hospital, for personal reasons, I won't reveal why, except to say that he is not in the best condition.

Second of all, I currently don't have a beta, which means I don't have much pressure to finish my work by a certain time limit. I looked on the beta-reading profile on this site and actually got someone who wanted to, but since I haven't gotten another e-mail from that person in almost a month, I'm presuming that they are no longer interested.

So, instead of asking around, I've decided to ask one of my readers to beta for me. There are, however, conditions for doing so. Someone who is interested in beta-ing for me must show me that they are capable of doing so. There will be a test.

It's relatively simple, all you have to do is beta one of three chapters that I'll mention in a bit.

Here are the rules; failure to follow all of them will result in disqualification. If you have any questions, feel free to PM me, or for more instructions.

**1 - **The betad must be chapter 2, chapter 3 or chapter 10. These a re the only chapters that I wrote that aren't betad.

**2 -** The chapter must be sent as a Word Document, with Track Changes enabled. This is very important because that is how I will expect to get my chapters if you are chosen. C&P documents will be deleted without being read. I don't care how good you are, it's useless if someone can't follow instructions.

**3 -** All submissions are to be sent to 'betaneeded at yahoo. Ca'. Please not this is not my personal e-mail, so don't even bother to add this account to YIM. If you pester this e-mail everyday asking who got picked, your submission will be deleted.

And that's about it. Pretty simple, right?

Good luck to all of you who want to participate!


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